I have a problem getting MySQl to run on my server. In Cpanel, I attempt to restart mysql server, and it spits out this error message:

mysql status root 30304 0.0 0.0 1972 920 ? S Sep12 0:00 /bin/sh /usr/bin/mysqld_safe --datadir=/var/lib/mysql --pid-file=/var/lib/mysql/plain.rackshack.net.pid

mysql has failed, please contact the sysadmin (result was "/usr/bin/mysqlshow: Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (2)").

I wonder if the route of my problems could be the reference to plain.rackshack.net. Could it be that it assumes my server name is plain.rackshack.net, when in actual fact, it is another name.

In Cpanel tweaksettings I even downgraded to msql 3, from 4. No dice.

Help!! Any ideas?

try doing:

1. stop mysql
/etc/rc.d/init.d/mysql stop

2. delete PID file if it is lingering
rm /var/lib/mysql/plain.rackshack.net.pid

3. start mysql
/etc/rc.d/init.d/mysql start

now what happens?

it is only using plain.rackshack.net to name the pid file (the pid file just stores the process id of the master mysql process). it shouldn't keep mysql from working if plain.rackshack.net is not actually your hostname, since it shouldn't try to resolve this.

Damned if that didn't work! A quick and effective fix, I'm up and running now.

Huge thanks!!

No problem, glad its working for you now